


International Relations

by grey2510, ThayerKerbasy



Series: Hell on Earth [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, Fluff, M/M, Sam Ships It, Sam and Eileen are awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-04
Updated: 2017-09-04
Packaged: 2018-12-23 19:34:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11996532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grey2510/pseuds/grey2510, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThayerKerbasy/pseuds/ThayerKerbasy
Summary: While in Europe, dealing with the soul contracts Crowley left to Dean (and enjoying a nice little vacation, just the two of them), Sam and Eileen video-chat with Dean and Cas. Sam wonders if Dean and Cas realize just how not-subtle they are.





	International Relations

**Author's Note:**

> Make sure you've read through Chapter 9 of "Well Endowed"!

Sam supposed he should have been used to Dean being an idiot. And he meant that in the nicest way possible: his brother wasn't dumb—hell, Dean was smarter than he gave himself credit for—but he was an idiot. An idjit, some might have said.

Dean was an idiot because he always assumed Sam was oblivious to the fact he and Cas were whatever they were. Sure, Sam tried not to think too much of his brother's love/sex life, but it was kind of hard when he'd been putting up with the UST and pining and angst for literal _years_. He couldn't even count how many times he had had to reassure Dean in the last few years that Cas was fine (the less said about Lucifer, or Kelly, the better). Although, speaking of Lucifer, Sam was pretty sure that if he hadn't been getting Satanvision™ about the same time Cas walked into the water from the leviathan, he might have been a little more aware of the fact that Bobby was essentially treating Dean like a grieving widower. He'd kind of noticed, but he'd been a little preoccupied to give it a whole lot of thought. Still, Sam had been on the front lines with Dean the Widower, Round 2 in the awful weeks at the beginning of the summer before Cas came back from the dead, thanks to Jack—and he'd had front row seats to their reunion and the joy and relief on his brother's face.

In any case, back to the original point: Dean was an idiot.

But Sam wasn't going to mention it. Not yet, at least. He didn't want to jinx it.

Dean and Cas had come back from their first contract-breaking case standing about five feet apart, rather stiffly, which Sam would have been worried about—considering the two of them had no idea what personal space meant when it came to each other—if he didn't know that Dean was the master of overcompensating denial. Every line and muscle in Dean's body had screamed, _Haha me 'n Cas always stand this far apart because we're just bros why would you think anything else lol we're just good buddies totally no homo._ Cas was a little more subtle, just because he was always a little more awkward, but he'd pretty much gone back to early days Castiel in posture.

So, yeah. That had been the first day.

And if Dean and Cas had thought they were fooling anyone (except Juliet) by sneaking down to the dungeon—Sam made a mental note to look up purifying (and possibly disinfecting) rituals—well, then they were both idiots. Having a hellhound pace around the door, whining, while both of them "mysteriously" disappeared wasn't exactly subtle.

Oh, and he hadn't exactly been out of earshot when Dean had told Cas, in a tone of voice that Sam had heard too many times on waitresses and bartenders, that Sam and Eileen would be in Europe, leaving them alone in the Bunker, for weeks.

That revelation had made him look forward to his trip with Eileen all the more.

He and Eileen were in Poland after a dizzyingly fast tour of Europe: a few days and nights in various cities and towns on the British Isles (with an extra day in Ireland so Eileen could show him around County Cork), two in France, one in Spain, a really long day in Italy (those two villages had looked  _much_ closer together on the map, but, live and learn), two in Austria… They were exhausted, but happy? The word felt a little strange to Sam, but, yeah: happy.

The trip had started off a little shy, neither of them really knowing how to act around each other. The last time they'd seen each other had been a mess of emotions, really. She'd shown up at the Bunker, completely unaware that they'd thought she was dead. Post-silver knife and holy water testing, she'd given each of them a proverbial smack up the side of the head for not figuring out her letter was a coded warning ("Really??? Would I use the word 'girly' like that???"). After that, it'd been a relieved and happy reunion, followed by a night of Sam and Eileen wrapped up in each other, simply taking comfort in having someone else there. It was markedly different from the last time they had done that, when Eileen had curled up into Sam's side after accidentally killed that Men of Letters guy, but it had still been new and innocent. But it wasn't as if this was something _official_ —Sam cringed to himself at the cheesiness of the word—and so he and Eileen had boarded the plane in Kansas a little like awkward middle schoolers at a dance.

Sam thought, at least. He'd never gone to a middle school dance.

Thankfully, that awkwardness had ended almost as soon as they got to their first stop, about an hour outside London, when they had exhaustedly fallen into bed together at the little inn that had only had one room available that night. She'd kissed him the next day, after they were leaving a shocked and relieved Mrs. Bhatia with the ashes of her contract in the house that had nearly been repossessed by the banks before she took the deal to give her children a home. He'd been standing next to the little blue rental car, fumbling his way through the signs to tell her they did good and he was happy for Mrs. Bhatia, when Eileen had smiled at his attempt, stilled his hands gently with her own, raised herself up on tiptoes, and kissed him.

It had been much easier, after that.

The inn they were at in Jędrzejów wasn't all that different from that first one, but after almost two weeks of this, they were sitting much closer on the tiny excuse for a loveseat in their room than they probably would have back in England. Then again, if they sat too far apart, they wouldn't both have been able to fit in the frame for their videochat back with Dean.

"Hey, guys," Dean waved with a goofy grin as he adjusted the angle of his laptop camera. "Hold on... " The camera spun around the library, then Dean resettled in a different chair than he had been in before; Sam assumed his brother had moved to reduce the glare on the screen from the wall sconces. "Oh, hey, there we go: Eurovision."

Sam rolled his eyes behind his glasses. "That's not… Never mind."

"Hi, Dean," Eileen waved. She signed as she spoke, probably out of habit more than anything, since Dean couldn't follow her signs and they were sometimes even too quick for Sam. "How's Juliet?"

Now it was Dean's turn to roll his eyes, but he made sure he was facing the camera and enunciating his words clearly when he spoke. "Everyone wants to know about the damn hellhound. She's fine." He moved the laptop to show Juliet, laying on the floor, looking deceptively like a smoky, overgrown, family dog. " _I'm_ fine, by the way. So's Cas."

"Where is Cas?" Sam asked as the laptop resettled on the table and Dean's face came back into focus.

"Around. He just discovered you can get Netflix on your phone, so," Dean shrugged. "Probably deep into _Jane the Virgin_." He crinkled up his nose. "That sounded wrong."

Sam chuckled, and exchanged a grin with Eileen. " _Jane the Virgin_?"

"Dude, I don't even know. Apparently, he's all caught up on _Orange is the New Black_." Dean shook his head, but with the kind of fond resignation that Sam's caught on his brother's face far too often these days in regards to Cas. "Anyway, 'nough about Mr. Roboto workin' on his human impression—how're you guys? You gettin' in touch with your Polish roots, there, Padaleski?"

Eileen frowned and looked between them. "Pada-what?"

Sam sighed and made two quick signs. "Long story."

Eileen smiled and nodded. She'd ask later, and Sam'd probably tell her, if for no other reason than the more people who knew that alternate-universe-Dean had been on a soap opera, the better.

"Hey, none of that secret-sharing," Dean pouted, and they both turned back to the screen. "I _know_ you're signing about me."

"You could learn, too," Eileen said, then signed something silently and slowly. Sam caught enough of it to puzzle it out.

"It's not too hard?" he translated. She beamed at him.

"Show off," Dean grumbled before teasing, "Then again, I ain't got a girl to show off to like Sammy does. Only girl in my life these days is Queen Hell Mutt over here." He jerked a thumb over his shoulder just in time for Juliet to let out a disgruntled and irritated growl at the moniker. The hellhound got up and stalked out of the room.

Sam bit back saying something like, _Nah, you have Cas to show off to._

"True love," Eileen joked. "Although, it looks like you might be sleeping on the couch tonight. Honey doesn't seem too happy."

Maybe it was the crappy camera lighting, or the weird coloration from the hellhound glasses, but Sam was pretty sure Dean _blushed_. He definitely swallowed uncomfortably and let out a feeble laugh. Sam decided to file that one away for later because he was pretty positive Dean wasn't thinking about the hellhound at that point.

Juliet returned to the library with Cas on her heels.

"Dean, I think Juliet wants to—Oh, hello, Sam." Cas said as he approached the table, standing awkwardly beside Dean's chair so all they could see was his torso.

"Pull up a chair, man," Dean said and there was some scraping off-camera as Dean probably dragged a chair over with his foot. Cas settled into it, squinting seriously at the computer and leaning until he was in the frame as well.

"Hello," he said, his hands moving fluidly, "you must be Eileen. I'm Castiel."

"Hi, Cas." Eileen grinned, then signed back, "You know ASL?"

As Dean watched, completely ignoring the computer, Cas nodded with a small smile. He answered aloud and by hand. "Of course, I'm an angel."

"You can teach Dean," Eileen responded, her signs much faster than they had been before. Sam couldn't tell if her grin had more to do with having someone she could properly sign with or because she'd picked up on Dean and Cas being Dean and Cas in all their awkward glory in the past few seconds. Or maybe both.

"Yeah, that'd be great, Dean," Sam encouraged, watching his brother flounder for a second. Actually, if Sam had realized Cas knew ASL (which, in retrospect, he probably should have), he might have asked Cas to practice with him since learning by video tutorials was kind of rough. But right now, watching Dean stutter was more fun.

"Um, yeah, I was actually...gonna...ask. Yeah."

From behind Dean and Cas, there was a whuff.

"I think Juliet is bored. Maybe she wants to go out and hunt." Cas rose again from the chair.

"Aw hell," Dean muttered.

"Can't she go on her own?" Sam asked. Surely, Crowley hadn't taken her out every time she wanted to hunt—he must have let her fend for herself without supervision.

"You wanna set her loose out there?" Dean huffed.

Juliet barked, and Sam privately agreed. It wasn't as if Dean could put her on a leash or easily track her down if she ran off. But, he did understand Dean's point: even if there was nothing he could do, Dean felt better knowing they hadn't just released the 'hound without a care.

"We've sent her out before—today even—and you didn't object," Cas pointed out.

"Well, yeah, but…" Whatever defense Dean was about to mount, he abandoned it quickly, rubbing the back of his neck.

Sam felt his eyebrows raise, and he decided he really didn't want to know why his brother was flustered by Cas' words or why the two of them had felt the need to send away the hellhound.

Cas continued, offering, "But, I'll take her, if you prefer. She might want some company. That's what I was coming here to tell you. You talk with Sam and Eileen."

"Thanks, man," Dean smiled, clapping Cas on the arm and maybe resting his hand a little too long on the trenchcoat sleeve.

Cas leaned down back into the camera frame to wave them both good-bye, a sentiment Sam and Eileen returned, until Dean swatted him out of the way. Dean watched them go, then cleared his throat and turned back to the camera once Cas and Juliet had left. Eileen shot Sam an amused look from the corner of her eye.

The rest of the conversation lasted another ten minutes or so—it was pretty late on their end, and Sam and Eileen wanted to get a good night's rest after traveling all day.

"We should be back next week," Eileen told Dean just as they were about to sign off.

"Awesome. Just send me your flight stuff so I can pick you up. Take care, guys."

"Yeah, you, too," Sam answered.

They logged off and Eileen flipped down the screen of her laptop on the coffee table. She chewed the inside of her cheek for a moment, then turned to Sam, crooking a knee into the back cushions.

"So, Dean and Cas," she said, hesitantly. "Are they…?" She bit her lower lip, obviously afraid to offend.

Sam fought down a laugh because _god_ it was obvious, wasn't it? To everyone but those two. Seriously: idjits.

He ran a hand through his hair. "I wish I knew. It's been like that forever." A thought occurred to him and he snickered to himself.

"What?" Eileen's dark eyes danced in the light from the nightstand, eager to be in on the joke.

"Dean's an idjit," Sam said, even if the word was strange off his tongue and he knew Eileen wouldn't get the reference. "He's got the house, the garage, the spouse, and the dog. He's got everything but the white picket fence and he doesn't even know it."

To be fair, a secret(ish) underground lair, a garage with a tunnel that looked like something out of a Bond flick, an angel (never mind the male part—not that Sam had been particularly surprised by that, but it hadn't really been on his radar, either), and a hellhound probably weren't what either of them had ever been thinking when they'd mentioned the apple-pie life.

Eileen smiled, then spun herself on the couch so she could rest against his side, tucking herself in under his arm. "Seems like he's got a good deal."

And for a moment, Sam wondered if he was a (normal) dog short of being on his way to having the same.

He rubbed his thumb in small circles on her arm and rested his cheek on the top of her head.

Well, if he was, he wasn't going to be an idjit about it.

**Author's Note:**

> If you like our stuff, we have more!  
> [Thayer's works](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ThayerKerbasy/pseuds/ThayerKerbasy/works)  
> [Grey's works](http://archiveofourown.org/users/grey2510/series)  
> And we Tumblr! @[grey2510](https://grey2510.tumblr.com/) and @[thayerkerbasy](https://thayerkerbasy.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Thank you for reading! Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated!!


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